It costs higher to get goods out from Apapa than Europe— Peter Obi
By Peter Obi, former governor of Anambra State and the Vice Presidential candidate of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Peter Obi, has underscored the trauma and frustration that characterize doing business in Apapa, Nigeria’s premier port city, saying that it is more expensive to get imported goods out from Apapa port than importing same from Europe.
Obi who spoke at the Vice Presidential Debate organized by the Broadcasting Organisation of Nigeria (BON) ahead of the 2019 general elections, explained that it was part of the failure of the present Muhammadu Buhari government that Apapa’s problem has remained unattended to.
Apapa is home to Nigeria’s two busiest seaports which account for 75 percent of the export and import activities in the country. Yet the port city has the worst of roads infrastructure which explains the congestion in and around the ports.
This congestion, coupled with poor port infrastructure, is reason for the high haulage cost that has increased by more than 300 percent in the past 12 months during which the condition of roads to the port city has deteriorated almost irredeemably.
Presently, traffic gridlock in Apapa has assumed an alarming proportion with long delays running into weeks and months for trucks to access and exit the ports, resulting to additional cost for transport owners.
To defray such losses, truck owners have increased the cost of moving cargo from Lagos ports to warehouses within Lagos, to the north, south-east and south-west. For instance, transporting 20-foot containers from Tin-Can and Apapa ports to any warehouse in Lagos that used to cost between N40-000 and N120,000 now costs N400,000.00, while 40-foot containers that used to cost between N50,000 and N250,000 now costs N700,000.
Also, moving 20 and 40-foot containers from Lagos to the north that used to cost between N500,000 and N600,000, now costs between N900,000, N1 million and N1.3 million. Taking consignment to the south-east which used to cost N250,000 now costs between N550,000 and 750, 000.
CHUKA UROKO